Israeli forces
with bulldozers
and jeeps entered the camp
under the cover of darkness.
This has become a routine
and this is the usual aftermath.
Wreckage and rubble, asphalt roa
plowed down to the dirt
Once the damage is repaired,
there's another raid.
And it's the same thing all over
For almost two years, a low inte
war has been raging
in the occupied West Bank.
Residents here in Janine's refug
say that there have been more
than 30 Israeli military incursi
ins since August of this year.
The camp is home to militants
who Israel has accused
of involvement in attacks on Isr
But here, those whom Israel call
terrorists are seen as fighters
against a decades long
military occupation,
with the aim Couscous is not a f
He works for the local governmen
He says the kids are.
But last week, Israeli
soldiers took over his home
during yet another raid
As he shows me around the
remains of
what was a family's
light crunch under our shoes.
I know brutal is how Wadiya sums
the soldier's behavior.
Scars of battles past pockmarked
the camp's
walls, debris on almost every co
I have some images.
Um, Sammy shows me spent cartrid
on the floor of her house
saying Israeli troops used this
to fire down into the street.
I had to do it,
but they took
my husband, bound his hands
and pushed him outside in the co
She says
They kept him there
from six in the evening
until five in the morning.
Eventually, the soldiers let him
but took away her recently marri
After ransacking his bedroom,
searching for weapons.
18 year
old Mahmoud
Abdulhadi was shot last Thursday
Shot through his bedroom window.
His mother holding a bloodstaine
Recounts how Israeli
soldiers
wouldn't allow medics
to taken to hospital So I was re
I was sure we were going to the
she says. We went downstairs.
A second officer was there and m
the medics put the stretcher dow
Mahmoud bled
to death in front of his home.
Tuesday night, Israeli forces
raided the camp again.
Sparking gun battles with milita
And in the process,
Israeli troops
killed at least four people,
including this eight year old bo
And then they left
And Ben Wedeman joins us now.
And Ben, as we've been reporting
there had been reporting
beginning of this year on the sh
the violence that we have been s
in the West Bank
pre-dates the October the sevent
I mean, we've seen over
260 Palestinians,
it seems, detained in the West B
since Friday.
24th,
and that is according to the Pal
society here prison society.
Why are more Palestinians being
Well, basically,
I mean, it really
since the 7th of October,
you've seen this great upsurge.
Now, of course,
I think part of it is
the Israelis are nervous
about the situation in the West
Let's keep in mind
that actually
the situation around Gaza,
except for a flare up back in
May of this year, has been rarel
But what we've seen is increasin
the Israeli government
has been focusing on the West Ba
We have no high extremist minist
in the Israeli government
who are pushing
the idea of expanding settlement
empowering the settlers more, ha
weapons to them.
So certainly
what we're seeing
is that
there's more unrest
among the Palestinians
who aren't happy with this.
But more than that, I think the
see the situation in the West Ba
and they're trying to sort of ke
that in
the natives under control, so to
But increasingly, as they watch
what's going on in Gaza
and they have been experience
experiencing in recent years
this upsurge in settlement activ
and settler violence, keeping in
how many have been killed
since the beginning of the war i
are almost 250.
It's a powder keg.
And even American officials
have warned
the Israelis
that they have to bring
the settlers under control.
And perhaps the conditions for m
given to Israel have to be incre
because of the trouble that can
by the current Israeli policy
in the West Bank.
You say it's a powder keg.
I mean,
you know, the region,
you know the West Bank better th
most journalists,
I think it's fair to say.
So I'm keen to get your sense, B
what the mood is like.
We are seeing
we've seen the past several days
Palestinians being released, a j
jubilant celebration.
Someone can't even celebrate out
Of course,
that's what we've been hearing
But if this truce is not extende
and we go back to Israel
trying to break the back of Hama
we've heard from the IDF
in the last few moments
saying they're preparing ourselv
for continuing of this fighting.
If that continues, what
what could change in the West Ba
Well, I think
that if
the fighting resumes in Gaza
and we see the kind of bloodshed
the sort of mass
killing of civilians in Gaza,
the situation could become
even more unstable.
Keep in mind
that it's not the Palestinian Au
backed by the United States
and the European Union
and led by Mahmoud Abbas
that's winning the freedom
of these Palestinian prisoners
and the detainees.
It's Hamas
and by and large,
the Palestinian Authority is loo
by most Palestinians in the West
as corrupt and incapable
and powerless when it comes to d
with the Israelis.
That's why, for instance, Jenin,
which technically is under Pales
Authority, control
the Israelis
every time they go into that cit
they drive right in.
The Palestinian police,
who I saw yesterday
when I went to Jenin, disappear.
They put up no resistance.
So the
the structure, the political str
that was established
by the Oslo Accords, sponsored
by the United States,
establishing the Palestinian Aut
that's eroding
as the war in Gaza continues.
If it continues,
and it probably will continue
in the coming days.
So politically, the head
at the top
of the Palestinian Authority is
not particularly stable.